Nitrofreak

Your very welcome, I love doing this for our men and women, been doing it for years now and enjoy every outing, god bless !!

It's a blessing to be able to do this kind of thing, some of these guys, like this marine, he has a competitive spirit, even though this is just for fun, he wanted to win, at the same time he wanted to learn how to pitch baits and skip them under docks like I was doing so I focused on teaching him and by the end of the day he was starting to get a couple of bounces together, he couldn't quite get the pitching down but he was defiantly determined, I reassured him that it takes practice and that he was on his way to doing really great, he missed the hook set on the one he lost at the boat because he wasn't watching his line as it was falling, I hollared at him to set the hook but he just didn't get it set in time but he almost caught it on his first good skip under a dock, it was priceless watching him learn new things and actually having a great time. If you ever get the chance, I'd take it buddy, it's always an experience you will never forget.

Had a great day out with a veteran, spent a whole week there looking for something that would work, it's been a pretty tough past few tournaments, even the big ones have only yeilded low teens, that information held true for the week I was there, very difficult to find any kind of pattern, only found one small school that was anywhere close to the bottom, the whole week yeilded only seven fish, the biggest one being a 5.5, a striper, and some 1.5 to 2.5, I kept checking in on that little school that I found all week as it grouped tighter and tighter and it ended up paying off, the third overcast day in a row as the tournament got started and we set sail to find the school, by the time we got to it, it had broken up again but were still in an area of about 150 feet and very close to one of the secondary points in the creek. First fish belonged to my warrior, a nice 2-1/2 pounder from a jig he was using then nothing, we decided to go investigate a couple of other spots that had provided a couple of bites, nothing, went back to the same point about an hour later and still couldn't get anything going, I ended up Texas rigging a Senko on a split shot and in that last couple of hours managed a limit. We both lost a decent fish, his at the boat, at least another 2-1/2, mine about 15 yards from the boat with a acrobatic back flip, those two fish would have won the outing for the lad, we finished 6th with an 8.26 bag out of I think 68 boats, not 100 percent certain on that number but I know it was in the higher 60's. Had a great time and very thankful for the things I am learning from the knowledgeable ones on this site, your teachings are not going to waste, very thankful of the service our men and women put forth to protect our freedoms, very thankful of the people who put things like this together on a grand scale and allow us to give back. Here is a pic of us holding our big fish that I had them take with my phone, God bless !!!

Great job Boomer !!!!!

I'll be there tomorrow, Sunday, in the am, if any of you venture out to the bend I have a black and silver Pro Craft, feel free to say howdy if ya want !!

Nice !!! Where at ???

I meant to note the current, worms work better when there is little current in the river, such as when it's low and the dams are closed or close to being closed.

No need for a new thread if you don't want to, I put Egypt Bend in because that's the part of the shennandoah I frequent the most, anyone can use this as they see fit if they wish. I had some luck with worms when the water was not so stained back a few weeks ago, most of the time it's creature baits that they like more anyway, not much in the way of other food sources along that stretch, small jig configurations seem to be preferred almost year round, sounds like a great outing Dave, thanks for the helpful tips man !!

Thanks for the tips man!! As for the ramp, I've done it so many times I just don't give it any thought, I used to have the family with me but they rarely go anymore.

There is a good chance I may be over there again this weekend, anyone else ?

Say when !!!

Great to hear !!! Thanks for the report Dave!!!

It's not as bad as it looks, the bad part is unloading and loading, only because you have to back in so far, if the ramp is soaking wet you may need 4wd if you have a bigger boat, other than that it's a decent place, I was there on Sunday after the storm working on my skipping, rat nested one that I just got, gave up and went fishing instead LOL ! what worked for me was zoom lizards pumpkin/chartreuse around all the wood in the upper regions of the river, nothing over 2lbs but caught 9 in an hour.

Have fun and be safe out there everybody, let us know how your day and weekend goes !!

It's roughly about 1/2 to 3/4 of a mile stretch of river you can fish from a bass boat, if you have a yak you can pretty much consider it unlimited, they have tournaments there as well, although I'm not sure which club puts them on but there can be up to 20 bass boats there on occasion that pretty much wipes out the parking area. Most of the time though if you get there early there is only a handful of anglers if that or later in the evenings are good as well. Hope to meet up with ya sometime.

Very greatful for your participation, where is this one at ? On the Potomac??

I used the one on Egypt bend road, it's the only public access ramp that I know of.

An absolutely amazing story young man and Congrats on a job well done to you both!!!

In Luray, I can get specifics for you, road names etc... If need be my friend. There was one guy there in a big red boat this past weekend the got almost that close to me as well.

Don't mean to bring up old posts but, I promised a pic as soon as it became available, here ya go.

Got the chance to fish our wonderful river system yesterday for about 2 and half hours, never seen so many big boats on the river before in that area, ended up with one bass for roughly a pound and a half after making adjustments, had some fun though. When I got on the water it was all muddied up from the boat traffic, anglers that spoke to me said that the fishing was null and void, I tried to find some water that was clearer but to no avail, everything was mostly chocolate milk. I kinda like these days myself, once you figure out that baits with a lot of vibration aren't cutting the mustard what's next? A hint from fishing muddy turbulent waters that we learned from in here is that the bass won't move very much at all when their surroundings become very limited with visibility suddenly, your focus becomes much more set on areas that bass may be using to feel a little more comfortable for them, lay downs, brush piles, docks, something that they can tuck in close to and give them some sort of point of reference, the fishing becomes much more precise and your working areas inch by inch instead of yard by yard, basically hitting them on the nose with your presentation, it's very difficult to keep a presentation in front of them for very long at all when boat wakes are rocking both you and the waters, keep your baits weighted with as little weight as possible, smaller jigs can be rigged with larger trailers to help slow the rate of fall, split shot rigs can help get your plastics in strike zones and hold them there for longer periods of time, it's a great time to work with your pitching, keeping your landings as subtle as possible is important, bare in mind that a lot of times these fish are spooked, it's basically the same thing as you walking into a well lit room and suddenly having all the lights turned off on you, it takes a few seconds to adjust and find your way around, same general thing for the fish. Pick your areas apart because they can be holding to just about anything and at any depth in situations like this and you will find fish.

Quality over quantity is what I fish for as well, however, I usually leave it up to my co-angler or co-anglers as to what their preference is, most of the time it's either family or a veteran, both like to fish for quantity but on occasion I will have one say lets go find some big-un's. Not too many have the patience to wait out a good bite when needed, my girls especially.

Be safe in your travels, be blessed with whatever else it is you wish to do, enjoy the beauty this great country of ours has to offer !!!

Low tide you need to move out to the outside of that grass line where the deeper water is, what I learned from my trip there last week is that when it's tough out there it pays off to go looking for areas that will hold the better chance for some residential fishing, fishing for fish that are resident fish that is, the place is so big and the creeks are so big that I figured there would be fish there in those creeks that don't even know the Potomac actually exists, good amounts of bait present helped with that a lot, fishing the bends of these creeks during tidal movements is really no different than fishing some of the Shenandoah river system, the only difference being that I noted was the predictability of where the bass will stage, the Potomac offers a bit more of that predictability with the tidal fluctuations IMO. Being brand new to the body of water I actually targeted stained areas, stained water is a little more forgiving when it comes to your presentations so I opted for having that flexibility, not sure what kind of experience you have on the Potomac but being new to the place it helped me a bunch.

Get very comfortable with a Carolina rig for that place, Anna is a prime candidate for that style of fishing, not a lot of anglers like it there but it is very, VERY effective ?